Most people, when they're about to die, see their life flashing in front of their eyes. It's all cake at their fifth birthday party, and their first kiss, and all those times their mom kissed away their boo-boos. I think I would have liked that. Reliving the moments with my mom, I mean. That would have been nice. But, me? When I think I'm gonna die? I don't get that. All I have time for is one thought, one measly question, before the world goes dark: Why the frak am I always paired up with Derek?
It was a better question than I realized at the time.
It all started with a bunch of suicides. The first two we investigated, but brushed off, because there wasn't anything supernatural about them, and they definitely weren't murders.
It sucked; I'm not saying that I wanted someone (or something) out there killing people, but at least then we could have done something about it, you know? But, as it was, there wasn't anything we thought we could do. Like I said, it sucked.
It wasn't until me, Scotty, and Isaac (ugh) were watching Danny suck face with a girl from his English class that I began to theorize the victims might not have been the ones under a spell.
"Is this happening?" Scott whispered, loudly in the silent cafeteria, but quietly for him.
Isaac tilted his head, sipping his milk thoughtfully. "Maybe he's got a lower number on the Kinsey Scale than he thought?" He wrinkled his nose up and stole a fry from my plate. Motherfucker. They were soggy cafeteria fries, but still. "Or maybe he lost a bet."
I swiped two fries from his plate in retaliation, but he was too lost in thought to notice. "Or maybe he's under a spell," I said under my breath, trusting their werewolf ears to catch it.
"You think?" Scott asked. He bit his lip, looking worried. "Maybe I should go sniff him? Do spells have smells?"
I was already pulling out my phone when he asked. I flipped through my contacts 'til I got to Wolverine, sadly one of the most called there.
911. Do spells have smells?
It took a few seconds for the reply to come. Horrible, wonderful, seconds, in which Danny moaned and my dick twitched in interest, because that? That was hot. Scott looked at me, scandalized, and I shrugged. It wasn't my fault he could smell that or whatever. (Except for how it kind of was…) The phone buzzed.
Sometimes. Where are you? What's happening?
I ignored the second and third parts. "He said sometimes. You should try, and if that doesn't work we'll skip and stop at Deaton's."
Scott stood slowly, like that would make it less obvious that he was weaving his way towards Danny and the very enthusiastic girl on his lap. If anything, it just made it more noticeable. A few heads swiveled his way, more as he got closer. Lydia and Jackson, who had been watching all this with an odd sort of fascination from the other two seats at the table, shook their heads slightly. No answers there. "Danny? Are you… okay, man?"
Danny paused for a moment, looking up from where his face had been buried in the girl's neck. He looked dazed. It reminded me of how Scott looked whenever he and Allison had been doing stuff I'd rather not picture them doing. "Really good, actually. Have you met Violet? She comes to our games all the time." Violet gave him a shy smile. "We started dating yesterday."
"Congratulations," Scott said, sincerely, because he's nice like that. "But, uh, we all thought you were gay?"
Danny nuzzled Violet's neck happily, then smiled with sage understanding at him. "There are always exceptions. Violet's mine."
"Cool." Scott stood there for a minute, then leaned forward to clap Danny on the back, taking a not so subtle sniff when he got close enough. Lydia rolled her eyes, and Jackson snorted. Scott patted Danny's back a couple more times, awkwardly, then turned and came back.
"Nothing?" Isaac asked.
"Nothing," Scott replied.
"Then off to the vet's we go."
On our way out we wound up collecting everyone else, minus Allison, kinda ruining my Wizard of Oz metaphor. It was cool though. Between me and Isaac I'm not sure who was the Lion or the Tin Man, and I wasn't sure I liked the idea of being either.
As we exited the building in the most unsuspicious way a herd of teenagers can manage in the middle of the school day, we watched Derek come tearing down the road in his sleek, black Camaro, looking like he was entering a warzone. Next to him, I reflected, we were damn near subtle. He pulled up haphazardly to the curb and wrenched open his door, scanning the area for threats. I waved at him.
"What's happening." Derek growled, eyes flashing red. "You texted 911."
"Danny was kissing a girl!" said Scott. Sensing the need for further information, he added, "Danny's gay. We think he might be a spell, so we're going to see Deaton."
"That's the emergency." He turned towards Stiles. "911 is for life or death situations, Stiles. Not for some kid experimenting with his sexuality."
"So if I texted you '911, I might be gay!' you wouldn't do anything? And here I thought we were becoming friends," I said. Snarked. Same difference.
He stared at me just long enough for it to be uncomfortable, then turned towards his betas. "Stay in school. If you skip too often they'll get suspicious, and I'll need you to be able to leave when the next threat's in town."
Isaac and Erica grumbled, but Boyd just shrugged and they turned back. Since everything else that had gone down they were starting act something like obedient. It was weird. What was even weirder though was the conflicted look on Jackson's face as his gaze flickered between Lydia, Derek, and the retreating betas. Lydia, bless her pristine, icy heart, just shoved him and said, "Go. I'll call you if something comes up." To everyone's surprise, except hers and seemingly Derek's, he went back in without so much as a defiant clench to his jaw.
Derek looked annoyed, but didn't say anything. Curiouser and curiouser.
We wound up split between three cars because Lydia didn't feel like catching a ride with either of us, which I pretended didn't hurt as much as it did.
Scott fiddled with the radio from his spot in the passenger seat, looking decidedly less mopey than he had since Allison declared that they needed a break. Danny's mysterious change in sexuality was apparently just weird enough to knock him out of it. I was enjoying it while I could; he was almost more focused on her when they were apart than when they were together. Besides, he was picking a radio station that wasn't spewing bland, nonstop angst music, which I chalked up to a win.
When we pulled up to Deaton's Derek and Lydia were already there, waiting outside. It wasn't surprising. I wasn't about to risk speeding and have my dad hear about me being out of school, so I had been driving at roughly the same speed as my grandma did when she came to visit.
As I parked Lydia tucked her lip-gloss and mirror back into her purse. Derek just continued to scowl. Scott got out of the car before I killed the engine, already heading for the door. I trailed after.
Inside there was only one person in the waiting room, a small, young woman with curly, blond hair and a small, black cat on her lap. She glanced at our small group curiously, but looked away when confronted with Derek's glare. Lydia smacked his arm and smiled at the nervous woman. "Do you know if the doctor's in? I left our dog, Prada, here for an inpatient procedure, but Derek here is really worried about him."
Derek continued to glower angrily, but the woman now looked at him sympathetically. "He said he'd be right back. He just needed to get some forms for me to fill out."
"Thanks," Lydia said. We all settled in the chairs, trying to look inconspicuous. We weren't very good at it, but the woman didn't seem to notice.
A couple minutes later Deaton appeared. He raised an eyebrow pointedly at Scott, but Lydia interrupted before he could say anything. "Could we see Prada? It's a bit of an emergency."
"Of course." Deaton turned towards the woman and handed her some forms. "This may take a while, Ms. Potter. Why don't you fill this out and leave it on the counter when you're done. Bastet should be fine as long as you make sure to give her her medication."
The woman smiled and nodded, and Deaton motioned for us to follow.
By the time we finished explaining Danny's situation to Deaton he was starting to look worried. I found that extremely worrying. "What's wrong?" I asked.
Deaton hesitated. "I can't be certain without more research-"
"What is it?" Derek growled. Shit, he didn't even like Deaton on a good day.
He gave Derek a look that made me pause, and he wasn't even looking my way. "As I said, I can't be certain, but it sounds like some sort of love spell."
He looked too apprehensive for it to be just that, though. "Then why do you look so nervous?" I asked.
"From what you tell me, Danny has no attraction to women, whatsoever. For someone to alter him on such a fundamental level, that uses a lot of magic. A good question to be asking yourselves right now is why someone would want to do that to him."
"We should start by asking Violet," Scott suggested. "Maybe she just wanted to be loved back. I mean, Danny said she went to all the games, and she seemed pretty happy to making out with him."
"Let's hope that's what this is. Lydia, Stiles, see what you can come up with. I'll check my sources and we'll compare our results tomorrow," Deaton said. "Derek, Scott, you might want to keep a closer eye on things over the next few days. If this isn't just some girls dream come true, things are going to start getting messy, and fast."
As we were leaving we ran into Ms. Potter, who was just leaving the newly filled out forms. She smiled winningly. "How's your dog?" she asked.
Lydia stayed and talked to the woman for a bit, jedi mind-tricking her into believing we were all normal. Derek high-tailed it out of there, and we followed close on his heels.
It wasn't until we were about to drive away that something that had been nagging, unformed, at the back of my mind came to the fore. "Hey, Scott, how long does it usually take to fill out that after visit paperwork stuff?"
He looked up from where he was fiddling with the radio again. "About five minutes, usually. Why?"
We'd been in Deaton's office for at least half an hour.
"Maybe nothing. I'll text you when I know for sure," I said.
As we pulled away, I made sure to memorize her license plate number.